Valentine Lovecraft Falcon

If I don’t get too Sun Ra esoteric about arriving from the astral plane into the physical one, the short answer is I'm from Cali', ha ha. I know for a fact one of my purposes is to ask questions.

Favorite artists:

Yoko Ono, Georgia O'Keeffe (I love her life, home, style, philosophy almost more then her art), Billy Sprague (living with a fellow artists is very inspiring and has informed a whole new facet of my life), Francis Mallmann, Maria Dixon, Rothko, the winemakers in my life, my soul-brother/mate Mac Mann eccentric and genius, I could go on.

What are you listening to these days?

Terry Riley, Arvo Part, raga music. Working with sound as a healing modality, I've been training myself to partake in the nuances of sounds and music in the environment. I suppose I'm broadening my 'auditory palate, which means less is more right now.

Favorite era in fashion and why?

I've been very drawn to ancient Greece, traditional Indian women's clothing (saris), Japanese farm working clothing (the worker's robe), and always African tribal attire. When I think of the common inspiring denominator of all these styles, it's the simplicity of the design. I also love seeing the women in India glittering with bracelets and sequins while sweeping and hanging laundry. It is definitely an aspiration, how to merge the beauties with the duties.

How did you begin working with sound as a vehicle for healing?

I didn't consciously work with sound as a healing modality until I moved to the Bay Area. I wasn't initially interested in pursuing it. I was like 'that's cool', but the path found me, so to speak.

I sang in a band for over 12 years and had a million vocal issues. It wasn't until a particular vocal coach asked me to sing in a higher register that I realized many of my issues with singing were emotional and belief based. I would literally cry and get nervous when I sang in these upper registers. I had other singer friends who also shared this experience. It became a point of intrigue to understand the nature of these upper registers and the emotional states they evoked.

For most of my singing years up until this last year, I felt a burdening disconnect from my voice. I couldn't harmonize when I sang with others, or sing spontaneously when asked to do so, which I greatly longed to do. My voice felt like an enigma that was only realized with my band. It was very disheartening yet it led me on a path to 'find my voice and set it free'. This is how sound healing found me.

I went to an open house at the California Institute of integral Studies, and Silvia, my teacher, was discussing the sound healing program she created and what it entailed. She had just written a book calledFree Your Voiceand she had everyone in the room sing 'ahhh” and “om' in unison, and somehow that was enough to lock me in. I knew instantly that I had found an answer for my voice conundrum. Little did I know I would embark on a complete paradigm shift that has now wedded me to the path of sound as an instrument and technology for transformation, liberation, emancipation, creation, healing, self-realization, etc. Can I get an amen? Ha ha!

What do you love about what you do?

I love that we are already equipped healers, singers, sounders, and creators from the day we're born (as babies we all can scream like James Brown and then forget how:))). There's nothing to buy, you don't actually need a teacher or guide.

Sound is important because:

Sound is important because everything is vibration. When we harness this vibration and apply it with intention for ourselves and others the results are instantaneous. The sound travels through our bodies, our bones; we are super conductors. It dissolves, decimates, breaks through all that blocks its passage. We get all theta waved out and relaxed, reconnecting with the natural state of allowing.

What is Voice Shrine?

Voice Shrine is essentially my personal ‘effects pedal’ for sound healing. After the one year certification program I began experimenting with various sonic modalities. I desired a way that resonated with my philosophy and aesthetics. After working with a daily mantra practise for an extended length of time I begin to witness my own personal ‘attunement’. I felt myself as a consummate instrument, a living ‘sound system’ (like an old school boom box) that merely fell out of tune for lack of use or union with it.

My vision for Voice Shrine is to facilitate and support the perception of the self as a profound musical and sonic instrument. To offer tools, techniques, and a sacred space to support others in freeing the self, body, mind, and voice of any obstruction or belief which disallows our unbridled natural inner song.

The voice is with you wherever you are. It goes where you go. It’s there as your offering, your companion, your tool for self transformation and for that of others. We create with sound daily, in words and intention. I wish to broaden the perceptions of this precious voice we have. Let it be a sanctuary and refuge -- a shrine:))), as well as a beautiful instrument to share and commune with others. We already have what we need, it’s merely a matter of becoming informed and then ‘playing’ your instrument. This is what I hope to achieve with Voice Shrine. “Home is where the voice is”.

What is one of the most important life lessons you have learned up to this point that you would want to share with others?

These are all pearls of wisdom that my teacher Silvia Nakkach shared and I’ve used them as totems through my daily processes:

Creativity is not an individual process

Dwell in the realm of no doubts

Beauty not duty

It will happen! (whatever you desire to have come to fruition, stay with it, develop a relationship with it, practice, it all arrives in right time)

Any Good dreams lately?

Yes, actually last night I dreamt of a gigantic fallen Sacagawea statue that was mostly embedded in the earth like the Easter Island monoliths. It was by the ocean and everyone there knew this was a secret magical site. There was a lot of exploration around the site and toward the end I remember five or six hummingbirds fluttering right before my face. I felt that it was a gift or a sign from nature and the universe, and I told myself to stay calm and RECEIVE what was occurring, and I did:).